Book Review – Breaking Dawn by Stephenie Meyer

I wasn’t a big fan of Twilight, but my daughter went on and on about it, so eventually she begged me to read it. No, I didn’t fall in love with Edward. Frankly, I thought he was a bit “stalkerish” and played mind games with Bella (It’s too dangerous for you to be around me, etc.). However, I read the other two in the trilogy and saw some redeeming qualities to Edward, although I’ll never be a swooning Twilight mom.

What I found more interesting, as an author myself, was that I could see a growth in Stephenie. Her writing got better and while I still think she’s overly in love with vampires and therefore makes them nearly flawless, at least the Cullens, when she does action, she is good.

This book blew me away with the fact that stuff that I thought she just threw into the first books were actually thought out and planned. It was easy for me to believe she wrote Twilight for fun, never expecting it would take off and then had to write more. No, apparently, she had it planned and it worked.

SPOILERS (Like anyone HASN’T read this yet!)

I do agree with one reviewer who said Bella’s love didn’t require any sacrifice. She got to keep Charlie, Jacob, Edward AND be a vampire (and therefore become beautiful, strong, perfect). She never had to deal with the struggles that newborn vampires usually had and this wasn’t sufficiently explain, at least from my point of view.

Life isn’t that perfect, but you know, what? This isn’t life. It’s fantasy, so I’m willing to overlook this, even if it bugs me a little.

The last few scenes kept me reading, even when my husband wanted me to turn the light off so he could sleep!

I wish Steph had done more with the Volturi wives. It was mentioned over and over that “even the wives are coming!” and this was a BIG DEAL, and nothing was done with that. This is a big flaw in the book, in my opinion.

Over all, I think this was the best of the four, and I do wish she’d play a little more in this universe. I’d love to see what she’d do with some of the other vampires (the Amazons fascinate me) and what will happen with Renesmee in the future!